“I was asked to be here to provide moral witness to the delegates of the Democratic National Convention, the civilian casualties that I myself witnessed while I was there, the entire families that were exterminated, health care workers, humanitarian workers, that have been killed in unprecedented numbers, child amputees, record numbers of child amputees, all the children who had survived and arrived injured at the hospital with no surviving family,” Haj-Hassan told WDET. “I myself treated several children who would fall into that category. And for these children, they would often die in our arms in the emergency department without any family around to comfort them, because their family were killed in the same attack, and without anybody to bury them once they were dead…it was honestly, completely, utterly devastating.
“So we feel like the only way to protect and preserve human life is to put political pressure at this point. The unconditional ongoing funding of the U.S. for this military campaign, it starkly contrasts with the documented realities on the ground, with the findings by the International Court of Justice — a plausible genocide — and with universal global condemnation from every human rights and humanitarian organization, saying ‘This has to stop.'”
Wallz and Harris have both spoken at AIPAC conferences, but it’s been years since for both of them.
Even if they’re “pro Israel” theres no chance they’re as unquestioningly as supportive as Biden.
And Wall has shown that he’s open to different viewpoints and modified his stance on the genocide long before being picked as VP.
Definitely still need to keep pressure up. But I’m cautiously optimistic
Based on the past couple of months and internal reporting I really don’t think either Harris or Biden like Netanyahu at all. I just think Biden and the Democrats overall have for so long been conditioned to protect Israel lest their high ground on right-wing extremism and antisemitism backfire and they lose Jewish-American votes or others sympathetic to Israel; so from a campaign perspective it can be perceived as zero-sum at best or worse a net-loss.
Then there’s the power of AIPAC, who are almost solely responsible for both Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush losing their primaries because of their outspokenness on Gaza.
So I fully expect a Harris administration post-election will be far more cold to Netanyahu and take more decisive action, but not before. Which doesn’t change much for me, considering in this dichotomous choice we all know Trump is far worse for the outcome of Palestinians.
There is one notable member of the squad absent at the convention, Rashida Tlaib. While Ilhan Omaar and AOC have endorsed Harris, she — the first and only Palestinian American in Congress — has yet to endorse. I do think it would be useful for Harris to meet directly with her.
Nevertheless I’ve been saying to my fellow advocates for Palestinians: The key to influencing administrative policy is side-stepping the administration and convincing your friends, family, acquaintances, and those on social media who are still sympathetic to Israel and who are ignorant to the atrocities they have committed. If you shift the polls, you will shift the administration who will perceive less risk in cutting aid to Israel. Even then from the administration’s perspective, there is still significant risk because Netanyahu could just so happen to ignore intelligence on an impending attack on Israeli soil and if another October 7th-like attack happens following a withdrawal of aid to Israel from the US, then that is going to look very bad and sink the Democrats. Don’t put it past Bibi to commit a false flag. That fucker is evil.
AIPAC is bad. But being from Missouri. Bush was always a weak candidate. My understanding is that Bowman was in a similar position? Bush in particular was swept in based largely around contemporary events that have since cooled. She doesn’t have a big history of civil service to build support from etc. She has some fairly signature legislation that she’s been involved with related to her community and district. But voters are ignorant, fickle, and more concerned with other things currently.
True Bowman was the guy who pulled the fire alarm during a vote. There was also some pretty tame ethics stuff with Cori Bush that if not for the amplification from millions of dollars from AIPAC probably wouldn’t have gone too far.
According to NYT, “Those two races became the most expensive in congressional history, because of AIPAC’s cash infusion.” (most expensive House primary in history, mind you). The damage of that money cannot be overstated.
Definitely. But a couple things to keep in mind. Primaries depending on office can be quite rare. And their budgets compared to general election campaigns are almost non existent.
It sounds like a big record because most people thinking money in politics think about state wide or national races. When they think money in politics. It’s still something to take note of, and a bad prescident. Because we should have less to no money tied up in politics. But it’s not as bad as it might seem. They had to break primary campaign Financial spending records. To remove two of the most vulnerable pro Palestine Democrats. And they didn’t even try with many of the rest. That’s the lens to look at it through.
In her very first foreign policy vote in January 2017, for instance, Harris sided with President Trump in criticizing the outgoing President Obama’s refusal to veto an otherwise-unanimous, very modest, and largely symbolic UN Security Council resolution on Israeli settlements. Among other things, that resolution reiterated previous Security Council calls for Israel to stop expanding its illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, which violate the Fourth Geneva Convention and a landmark ruling by the International Court of Justice.
There was an anonymous aide who said something, then National Security Advisor to the VP said they wouldn’t do a full embargo that would leave an opening for Iran to attack.
But they also said Biden wasn’t stepping aside for any reason right up until the second Biden stepped down.
That article I linked is a good read, there’s a lot of pressure from within the party for an embargo. And both Harris and Wall’s are open to discussions, and have already been having them.
They’re not perfect, but they’re open to a dialog. It’s a huge improvement from Biden.
They could still drastically limit what types of weapons get “sold” to Israel and what quantities.
Put it on Israel:
Save these for defense or use them for a genocide, but we’re not just giving you everything you ask for.
If Bibi uses them for genocide and leaves Israel open to an attack from an actual country with a functional government and military, that’s probably the fastest way to get Bibi out of power. There’s already been huge protests in Israel for months calling for him to step down. And he’s delaying an election he’s almost guaranteed to lose.
It just doesn’t take as much as you seem to think to end this.
Vice President Kamala Harris’s national security adviser said on Thursday that she did not support an arms embargo on Israel, laying out one of her first firm policy positions since becoming the Democratic nominee on how she would approach the war in Gaza. The adviser, Phil Gordon, said on social media on Thursday morning that Ms. Harris would “always ensure Israel is able to defend itself against Iran and Iran-backed terrorist groups.” He added: “She does not support an arms embargo on Israel. She will continue to work to protect civilians in Gaza and to uphold international humanitarian law.”
The article you linked has great language but effectively means absolutely nothing. Empty words are the same thing we’ve heard from Biden the last 10 months.
An arms embargo in some form is literally the only leverage the US has that could change Netanyahu’s mind, at this stage. Personally, I don’t think Kamala has the guts for it.
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Did any of the main news channels in the US even cover this panel? I haven’t seen any. The media and online punditry seem far more happy to obsess over Hamas flag waving protesters outside than to listen to experienced doctors relay the horrors they saw in Gaza.
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